Shuriken 061

The Shuriken 061 FISE, #50065. This example
has seen some use. The venturi has been drilled on the
right side to take a flood-off inlet.

The Shuriken multi-purpose wrench.

The Shuriken was the first really powerful F1J engine to be
manufactured. The Shuriken is a lovely engine and is still the
only American F1J engine to have been made.

My Mk 1 FISE (Front Induction, Side Exhaust), serial number
50065, is pictured above. It did 26000 rpm on an APC 6x2
propeller. This was vastly over propped: the engine's peak output
was 0.35 bhp at 35,000 rpm and it was stressed for 40,000 rpm.
However, the smaller props needed for the high revs produced
considerably less static thrust, and hence an inferior climb
compared with the APC 6x2. At 62.1g in standard trim it is the
lightest of the hot F1J engines.

Mark Panos had a late Mk 1 FISE 050, serial number 50214,
which he used for 1/2A Pylon Racing. He reports that on 20% nitro
it turned a 5 x 3 Tornado at 32,000 - 33,000 rpm on the ground
and really unloaded in the air. One of his friends bought a Mk 2
FISE 050 but it was disapointing: on the same fuel and prop it
was 4000 rpm down at only 28000 - 29000 rpm.

There was also a FIRE (Front Induction, Rear Exhaust) model
that was designed to use a tuned pipe. Both FISE and FIRE models
were available as 050s or 061s. All four variants used a Glo-Bee
head insert held in with a clamp ring. The cylinder was ABC
technology. It used a thin walled brass liner in which the
transfer passages and ports were formed by removing vertical
sections of the liner: the piston skirt formed the inside wall of
the passage. As the liner wall was thinner in the 061 versions,
its possible that their breathing was restricted compared with
the 050s. The piston was extremely light and made from a very
soft aluminium alloy containing 40% silicon. My 061 required a
new piston after the plug dropped an element but the chromed bore
was undamaged - a real tribute to the production quality. The
venturi was a screw-in unit whose bore was selectable to suit the
engine's application. It had three equally spaced peripheral jets
fed by an annular gallery machined into the venturi body above
the thread and sealed by a shoulder that screwed down onto the
crankcase surface. The brass needle assembly was remote from the
venturi with a narrow bore connecting it to the fuel gallery. It
was pressed in after carefully aligning the fuel exit hole with
the transfer bore. The bore's diameter was reduced to a minimum
to control surging: with ear defenders on you could hear the
engine note wavering slightly due to residual surging, though it
was too slight to be seen on a digital tachometer. The backplate
was a screw-in unit with a central pressure tap.

The multi-purpose wrench shown below the engine was used to
unscrew the backplate, to remove the Glo-Bee clamp ring and to
unscrew the spinner.

Production versions

The Mk 1 was produced as a single batch of 250 engines, made
up from a mix of 050 and 061 capacities in both FISE and FIRE
formats. They were anodized red with BV engraved on the
left side of the NC machined case, which was a work of art. The
serial number is engraved on the underside of the left mounting
lug. The clamp ring was bare metal so there was good electrical
contact with the glow clip. This version had two design
faults:

the brass spacer behind the front race had too large an OD
and if misaligned, which was easy, would scrape material off
the inside of the case. This debris scuffed up the shaft seal
and eventually destroyed the rear bearing. The debris from this
then wrecked the piston.

the 061 model was effectively a bored out 050, which
resulted in a thinner liner: the OD remained the same but the
cylinder bore was increased. The unintended result was that the
Glo-Bee button was just 1.4 mm bigger in diameter than the bore
so the contact area was only 0.7 mm wide before allowing for
the radiussed outer rim of the Glo-Bee button. This caused the
top of liner to distort when the head clamp was tightened,
causing a permanent distortion of the inner edge of the copper
head shims. This was probably not a problem with the 050
version.

The Mk 2 was outwardly identical except that it was anodized
gold with VE engraved on the left side of the NC machined
case. Serial numbers, starting at 50500, were machined into the
opposite side of the case. The liner was revised: the transfer
ports were machined into the outside of the liner rather than
retaining the cut away vertical sections of the Mk 1. As the
liner wasn't appreciably thicker than on the Mk 1, this probably
restricted its breathing. Other revisions were a change to an
inferior liner hardening technology and an excessive reduction of
the bore's taper. As a result these engines wore out fast and ran
considerably slower than the Mk 1.

Production ceased when the partnership of Fred Baldwin and Jim
van Arsdall broke up: collectors probably have most surviving
Shurikens by now.

Resurrection

A new Shuriken 061 FISE.
This example is the third I've seen on eBay.

During 2005 a small number of new Shuriken 061 FISE engines
appeared on eBay. I've seen
three so far: there may have been more. The accompanying text for
the third auction read:

You are bidding on a new in box with papers and wrench Shuriken
AAC 06 competition model airplane engine. It was designed by
Fred Baldwin and assembled by Glenn Lee.

These Shurikens have not all been auctioned by the same
source, though the wording of the advertisements has been quite
similar. At least two of the sellers have been fairly bigtime
dealers in collectable model engines. Neither appears to be
either Fred or Glenn. All have a modified crank case: the
overhanging fins at the rear have gone, all four vertical edges
of the head fins are rounded off and the logo on the left of the
case is just B. The colours are much brighter and
different from the original engines: two cases have been violet
and the third was electric blue, all the backplates have been
gold with black spinners and intakes. The first two had gold,
flush mounted head clamp rings and heads adapted for Nelson
plugs. The third seems to be fitted with a custom button head and
a black head clamp that stands proud of the case. The wrenches
look like they were made as part of the original, cherry red,
batch of engines. The boxes may also be from the original
production run because the first two were described as being
supplied in "shop soiled boxes". All three have had the same
blue-grey plastic ring fitted in place of a prop. None of the
production engines were supplied with this item. All three
engines have been described as AAC, while both production batches
had ABC cylinder technology.

A Shuriken 061 FISE assembled by Glenn Lee.
Greg Kamysz took this photo at a swap meet.

Glenn Lee is responsible for the production of these engines.
Greg Kamysz, who flies electric RC but likes engines, met him
when he was selling a couple of examples at a swap meet. Glenn
said that he purchased the left over parts when Fred Baldwin went
out of business and that he has a number of crankcases. He will
be making missing parts to complete those engines. My best guess
is that Fred was planning a limited run of what would have been a
Mk 3 Shuriken under a Baldwin logo but never completed
them.

Greg expects all these engines to end up in collections.
Judging by the prices paid for them I think he's dead right. I
don't know what the first to appear on eBay sold for, but the second and third
fetched $US 300.00 each. By comparison the Cyclon 061, which at the time of
writing in early 2006 is probably the best current F1J engine, is
available for $US 190.00.

Spares

Jeff Cook, who supplied information about production batch
sizes and identification marks, worked for Jim VanArsdall on the
Shuriken project as a consultant and machinist with
responsibility for optimising the cylinder porting. He tells me
that both he and Jim still have a fair inventory of parts. They
are happy to supply them to anybody who needs replacements. You
can contact Jeff via the e-mail link at the start of this
paragraph.

In addition, other people bought parts at the same auction as
Glenn Lee. Some of these have appeared on eBay, but their whereabouts and
availability are not known.